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Not that the rest of the year’s much better. Take November for instance. Take it on a boring night
as a fat rain fell, the drops thick and icy cold, but too lazy to turn to snow. I was slumped in my ratty
recliner, getting ready to watch Nell Parker, a dead stripper I’d had an unusual relationship with, on the
tube. Sure, I could’ve shut it off, but there’s nothing like seeing the face of someone you want to forget
every day on TV.

She’d gotten the gig partly as blowback for the Chak Registration Act; chakz, short for charqui, or
dried meat, being the preferred term for us zombie-types. Thanks to an undead-riot caused by a pal of
mine, an awful lot of livebloods died. Jane and Joe average didn’t like that much, so some pretty
Draconian laws were passed. As a nod to the bleeding hearts worried about chak rights, a “good” dead
person was given a talk show.

Nell was better than good, she was perfect—smart, pampered, and nothing missing. Her skin was
white and silky smooth, not the usual rough gray, her black hair straight and shiny. Oh, they had to
work at it. I read the studio was kept below sixty to ensure rot didn’t set in. But best of all, Nell was
also the only chak with eye color, green, no doubt to match her benefactor’s last name, he being
billionaire pervert Colby Green. He and his powerful buddies loved chakz any way they could.
Despite the fact that TV was a definite step-up from pole dancing at Green’s private orgies, Nell

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never seemed to appreciate it. She tried to look harmless, knowing that the whole point was to show
that all chakz weren’t a threat, but there was always a hint of disdain in those emerald eyes. It made me
feel like she was looking at me.

The show itself was bullshit, fluff designed to make LBs feel better about imprisoning us. Not that
I blame them for that. If a chak gets too depressed, they go feral. That’s kind of like going postal, but
only if George Romero directed it. Thanks to the new laws, any chak who could speak or write had to
take a monthly emotional stability test. Pass, and you’re free to enjoy your second-class citizenship for
another month. Fail, and they put you in a concentration camp until you do go feral. Then they safely
destroy you. They’re not clear on how they do the destroying. No one likes watching sausages getting
made, or burned.

On the plus side, we all get free cell phones. Not that many of us know how to use them. In theory,
they can be used to track us if we go AWOL. In reality, the guard, a volunteer group composed mostly
of testosterone types who used to spend their weekends chopping us up with machetes, is charged with
chak control, and they don’t like sharing with local law enforcement. It’s moot in my neck of the
woods. Fort Hammer doesn’t have the equipment to track anything. All in all, not so much Big Brother
as his big, dumb, inbred cousin.

To be fair to Nell, she tried to branch out. She’d done a series of interviews with no less than
ChemBet’s head of R & D, Travis Maruta, the man who made zombies real. A mousy guy you
wouldn’t think had it in him to swat a bug, let alone change the world, he went on about how hard he
and his wife Rebecca were working to improve the human race even more.

The way I heard it, Rebecca was a second-rate chemist, but a first-rate dominatrix. She’d gotten
Travis into some kinky shit that made Colby Green look like a virgin. I doubted either of them gave a
damn about anything except getting each other off.

3

But there are lies, and then there are damned lies. The former would be something no one believes,
like if I were to say Nell Parker meant nothing to me. The latter would be a whopper, like my
execution. When that needle pierced my soft pink skin, I thought at least nothing worse could happen.
It wasn’t the first time I was wrong, but it was the last time my skin was soft or pink.

When DNA evidence threw out my conviction, I was subjected to ChemBet’s patented, self-
perpetuating, neo-magical, electrostatic Radical Invigoration Procedure, RIP, for short. I came back
with dry skin, brittle bones, sixty percent of my IQ, and none of my photographic memory. And they
said I was one of the lucky ones.

Now my memory’s like an old dog without a leash. It either lies around doing nothing, or winds up
eating things it shouldn’t. When I thought Nell betrayed me by going back to Green, it reminded me of
what an angry guy I’d been when I was alive. After that, I started thinking she was better off without
me. I contented myself with stalking her on TV, but that night, she came on without the fake smile and
barely able to speak.

“Dr. Travis Maruta,” she finally managed, “was found dead yesterday in his ChemBet laboratory,
apparently from a self-administered overdose of an unknown substance. It was November twelfth, the
eighth anniversary of his invention of the RIP...”

Some chakz would find the news satisfying; others say that real death was too good for him. Some
would be too decayed to have an opinion. Me, I was thinking, Suicide? Maybe the whiny son of a bitch
finally realized what he did.

Big picture, I couldn’t care less. Sure, I wished he’d killed himself before he came up with the RIP,
but blaming Maruta for my problems was like blaming Henry Ford for car accidents. When they
switched from Nell to a “real” newscaster, I got bored, turned the set off, and took to watching the
shadows on the floor. 4

I was doing a pretty good job thinking nothing, when a knock came at the door. Answering was
Misty’s job, my assistant, but she was out with Officer Chester O’Donnell, a boy toy she’d met while I
was in jail. When the knock came again, I remembered it might mean money, and that was in short
supply. Business, never booming, had gone downhill since the camps opened. Mostly, I’d get some
chak hoping I could help him or her cheat on their next test, which I couldn’t. Misty ran a little
memory class that made more than I did, and she hated charging.

But, seeing as how you never know, I shambled into our so-called reception area. The bottom half
of the door wobbled from a third rap.

“Who is it?” I asked.
No answer, but the next knock came faster. With a grunt, I opened the door.
No one was there. Not even a raven squawking nevermore. A cold, wet gust of wind slapped my
face and set a loose bit of cheek-skin wobbling. I should’ve had Misty sew it, but the cold weather,
while it helped me keep, made me lazy, like a reptile. At least the building was rotting faster than I was.
The three story walk-up lost half a wall last week. The rooms across the hall were no longer habitable.
A chak or two downstairs were the only other occupants. You get what you pay for, and the landlord
stopped charging rent when the building was condemned.

I started thinking the knock was a loose board about to fall, but didn’t see any new leaks. And then
I looked down.

Six inches from my feet sat a weathered briefcase, cracked and dented as my loafers. But that
wasn’t the first thing I noticed. That’d be the hand gripping the handle. As usual, an arm was attached,
but after that, nothing. No head, shoulders, knees, or toes, just briefcase, hand, and arm.
There’s a knock-knock joke in there somewhere, but I don’t know what it is.
As I stared, the hand let go of the case, raised its fingers and wobbled the tips as if feeling the

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empty air. It regripped the handle and squirmed, stub first, dragging itself and the case inside. It
crawled through the front room and into my office, leaving a thin trail on the floor. I thought it was
oozing the gray stuff chakz have on their insides, but a closer look told me it was rainwater mixed with
street grit.

At the center of the office floor, it stopped, like it was expecting me to join it.

I wondered if I’d fallen asleep in the chair. Chakz are tough to kill. Knife wounds, gunshots, even
the loss of a limb or two, won’t stop us, but our pieces, unless it’s the head, don’t generally get around
on their own. Still, I’d seen a walking skeleton and a laughing skull, so I didn’t think it impossible.
There was a lot about the radical invigoration process no one knew for sure.

I stuck my head out and looked down the hall, in case it was some joker with a remote. Livebloods
don’t bother with me, and the only chak I knew warped enough to pull something like this was
Jonesey, and he’d been shipped off to the camps after failing his last test, stupid bastard. We tried to
help him study. Well, Misty did, I wasn’t speaking to him on account of he was the one who caused the
riot. Maybe, like Nell, he was better off. He’d already gone feral once, until I slapped him out of it. You
can do that sometimes.

Other than the wind, and the rain pouring from the gaping ceiling holes to the mottled floor, there
was nothing. No second arm, no torso, no legs or head that’d fallen behind.

I closed the door and turned back, half expecting my guest to be gone. It wasn’t. It was still there,
rapping its fingers on the case like an impatient salesman.

Comfortable that it wasn’t going to bite, I stepped closer for a better look. Its skin didn’t look
chak-gray, but my sense of color isn’t great at night. It wasn’t thin. It had muscles, legit, not baby-
smooth like a bodybuilder’s. The fingers had less character, but they were thick, rugged. A
workingman’s arm, if I had to guess. It kinda reminded me of my father’s arm, a thought that added

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to the scene’s dreamlike feel.
Christ, I hadn’t thought about Larry Mann in ages. I wouldn’t say he was a violent man. If I did, I
was afraid he’d hit me. But that was crazy. The arm couldn’t be his. Its fingers were intact. Dad lost the
top halves of four digits when he fell into a circular saw. He was so drunk he didn’t even notice they
were gone until he reached the hospital.

The rest of him left us about a year after that. Mom tried to lie about it. He’d been a drill sergeant,
so she told me he’d signed up for Special Ops, but I saw the papers marked dishonorable discharge. I
figured he was out on the streets somewhere, missing his fingers more than he missed us.

Whatever. The arm wasn’t in any position to say who it belonged to, or what it wanted. Maybe if I
got it a pen? I stepped behind my desk and pulled open the top drawer. Outside, the hiss of wheels on
wet asphalt mixed with the rushing rain.

I don’t know how the arm could’ve heard it, maybe it felt the vibrations, but like a demented cross
between snake and monkey, it let go of the case, righted itself at the elbow, sprang to my desk and
bounded over to the windowsill. The fingers felt frantically along the glass, down to the wood. It was
trying to open it, to get away.

“Wait!” I shouted. Like it could hear me. What could I follow that up with?
Don’t jump! You’ve got so much to live for!

I tried to grab it, but it punched a pane, shattering the glass and a good chunk of rotten wood. With
a rubbery twitch, it tumbled into the gray. I snatched at the air. The wind sent bullets of rain into my
face. I leaned out of the hole it’d left and looked down at wet trash, a rusted Dumpster, and puddles.

2
THROUGH the broken window, I heard a warm, familiar chuckle. It was Misty, laughing
good-naturedly at a taxi driver’s joke before closing the passenger door. Chester had sent
her home by cab again.

November wind and water bitch-slapped the unpaid bills on my desk. The briefcase
sat on the floor like a lottery ticket begging to be scratched. Whatever was in it might
solve my money troubles. There could be a reward for returning it. But something told
me to stay away, not even think about it.
Tough luck about the thinking. When I was ripped they gave me a new set of clothes
and a pamphlet. The clothes didn’t fit and the pamphlet wasn’t good for much, but it did
warn that chak bodies could be unpredictable. My left knee, for instance, shivered
without warning. Lately, it was thinking I couldn’t control. The tired wheels turned in my
homicide detective head, but I had no idea how to put the brakes on.

When Misty walked in half a minute later, I was back in my chair. She looked good;
meat on her bones, verve in her movements. She was a world away from the starving
addict who used to think she could pass for a chak. But everything comes with a price. In
this case, it was her increasingly annoying optimism.

Hair and clothes damp, she shook the rain from her umbrella. “What am I going to
do with you?” she said when she saw me. The smile on her face kept her from looking
disapproving. “You’ve been sitting there feeling sorry for yourself since I left, haven’t you? Moping.”8
“Mostly. How was the date? Bowling again?”
She leaned the umbrella against the wall and worked the buttons on her thrift store

overcoat. “Don’t change the subject. If it wasn’t for you passing that test, I swear I’d be
sleeping with that sledgehammer next to my cot again, waiting for you to go rabid.”

“Feral.”
“Don’t tell me what word to use. You think there’s a difference?”
“My mouth can’t foam. And don’t you tell me you trust that government questionnaire. Not after they took Jonesey.”
Her face went a little sad. She’d liked Jonesey, too. “You said yourself he tried to eat
you in an alley.”
“He got better.”

“You’re also the one who told me once they go, it’s only a matter of time.”
“Something I heard on TV.”
“Watching your girlfriend again? The one you won’t speak to even though she gotyou out of jail?”
“I heard that a long time ago. Good Morning Fort Hammer, I think.”
She hung the coat on a stand and came closer, which didn’t take much. My office,
the front room, the half bath, and the walk-in supply closet she used as a bedroom would
all fit in a stretch limo.

She gave me a somber once-over. “Your memory’s getting better.”
“Because you drill me every day.”
She slapped my shoulder. “Every other day. You know that.”

9

“It’s a fucking game, Misty. Passing doesn’t make me safe any more than failing
made Jonesey dangerous. Look how many idiots get driver’s licenses. That’s a test, ain’t
it?”

“You are one big dead baby, Hessius Mann. I’m trying to hold on to hope here, that’s
what keeps it from happening, right? Or do you enjoy acting like a piece of furniture? I
can’t even feel comfortable going out with Chester for a few hours with you...” Her
voice trailed off.

She had more energy and I was getting slower. We’d become a bad combination.
That much was obvious even to me.

“About the boy toy, I’ve been meaning to tell you...”

“He has a name,” she said. In a huff, she turned her back, walked off and grabbed a
towel.

“So do I. He ever use it, or is he still calling me it?”

I was trying to be nice, but couldn’t manage it. I could say chakz have trouble with
emotions, but really, I was being an asshole.

“He’s working on it. It’d help if you’d talk to him. Even nod at him.”

I could see from a mirror that she’d scrunched her face, sending rainwater from her
hair down her cheeks, into the towel. The smile she came in with was gone. Great, now
I’d ruined her evening.

I raised a hand to slow her down. “That’s what I’m trying to say. I think I misjudged
you two. I mean, I thought he needed sex and you needed a favor. Maybe that’s how it
started, but, it doesn’t look that way anymore. You’re still going to meetings, and more
often than not, you look... happy.” 10

The smile came back in a flash. I didn’t know whether to feel good or bad about it.
“So I have your permission to date him now, Dad?”
“No, but he’s got a salary and a real place. If you wanted to leave...”
When she turned back I finally noticed that the ice green blouse she wore looked
new. She wasn’t unhappy again, but she was serious. “And what would happen to you if I
did? We’re in this together, remember? How can I think about moving out when all you
ever do is... what the fuck happened to the window?”

I was wondering when she’d notice.
“Oh, that. An arm punched its way out.”
“Your desk is soaked.” She rushed toward it with the towel and nearly tripped over
the briefcase. “And what the hell is this?”
A few drops of rain fell from her to the case.
“The arm dropped it off before it jumped out the window.”
She laughed, and then stopped. “Seriously? Have you been drinking? Can you drink?”
“I can go through the motions.”
She looked back down at the case. “What’s in it?”
“Don’t know.”
“You didn’t open it?”
“If I did, I’d know.”
She lifted the case and plopped it on my desk, mushing a few soggy bills in the
process. “What if it’s a job, something to work on? Better yet, something that pays.”
Before I could answer, she flipped the latches.

11

“Misty, don’t...”
It opened easily. Whatever was inside bathed her in a quiet blue light.
“Fine. Have it your way, Pandora. What’s in it?”
She twisted the case away. “You want to see, get off your leathery ass.”
“Misty...” I groaned and shifted, planning to get up. I wasn’t fast enough. She
picked up the case and headed toward the front room.
“Now you have to walk for it. Shamble for me, zombie-man.”
“Don’t play with that thing! What if it’s poison? Remember the nerve gas?” She
stopped. “And if there’s any fingerprints, you’re ruining them.”
Gently, she put it back on the desk where I could see. Inside, it was mostly foam, the
edges stained a sickly brown from the dirt and water that’d seeped in. In the center were
two glass vials, each nearly filled with a clear, bluish liquid. The streetlight outside the
window had given them the glow. We stood there staring like we were watching an
interesting movie.

Misty broke the silence. “You really think it could be poison?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think. It is what it is. Best guess? Drugs. Drugs is always a
good guess. A stash swiped off a dealer by a stupid chak who didn’t get away in one
piece.”

“Wasn’t there a chak living down the block that was just a head, torso and arm?”

I prodded the foam. “No arms. One leg. Vernon Gray. They took him to the camps a
month ago after he tried to fill out the test with his foot.”

She gave me a look. I knew what it meant. “Yeah, I remember some things.”
“So, what’re you going to do about it?” 12

“Me? Not a damn thing. Cops would never come here, but you could call Chester.
Then it’ll be the police’s problem.”

Her eyes narrowed.
“What? You want me to taste it?”
“You’re a detective. You could try, you know, detecting.”“I am! Handing it over to the cops is the smart move! Stop being so damn cheery and
get realistic. It’s a briefcase with two glass vials. What else am I supposed to detect? I
could yank the foam out and see if there’s anything underneath it, but if the blue stuff is
dangerous some of it could get loose.”

She crossed her arms. “That case was brought to you for some reason. Are you really
going to just give it away?”

“Why not? If a bullet’s got your name on it, does that mean you shouldn’t duck?”
She turned away. “Have it your way. I’ll call Chester.”
We were stuck in a stupid dance, but I didn’t know how to get out of it. I didn’t want
to drag her down, but I didn’t want her dragging me up.
As she went into the front room to get her cell, I couldn’t help looking at the vials
again. Unmarked, clear glass, real thick. Could be from a high security lab or a dollar
store. Damn.
A frigid blast turned me back to the window. I grabbed the towel she’d left on the
desk, balled it up and stuffed it into the broken pane. The effort gave me a view of the
roof across the alley.
Something moved.
It was probably a shadow, but I shuddered just the same. If I were the melodramatic

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type, I’d say it looked more like a figure that’d been watching, and now it’d seen enough.
After all, an arm had just brought me a present. Who knew what else was out there
tonight?

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comments:

In Stefan Petrucha's world, there has been a discovery of how to re-animate persons wrongly put to death. Hessius Mann used to be a police officer whose wife was murdered. Since she was having an affair, it was assumed he killed his wife. He was tried and found guilty, then sentenced to death. His sentence was carried out only to discover that they had it all wrong. To give the dead their due justice, they're re-animated if possible. They're not slathering zombied brain eating zombies, at least not initially. The only trouble with the walking dead, is after a while, they start losing cohesion, figuratively and mentally. The Hessius Mann Novels are told with more than a touch of humor, a tweak of absolute undeniable inevitability, and a lot of heart. If you try one, you might find the zombie story that your palate can tolerate. Definitely not your usual zombie story.

This Could Mean Trouble in Paradise

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